WEBVTT - The Devils You Don't Know 0:00:11.760 --> 0:00:15.000 Good morning, peeps, and welcome to WOKP Daily with Meet 0:00:15.040 --> 0:00:19.439 your Girl Danielle Moody, recording from the Home Bunker, Folks. 0:00:21.200 --> 0:00:25.320 It is wild when I take off for a couple 0:00:25.320 --> 0:00:29.160 of days and come back and things are just as bad, 0:00:29.320 --> 0:00:33.680 if not worse, than they were the week prior. But 0:00:33.760 --> 0:00:36.480 that is where I find myself after coming back from 0:00:36.479 --> 0:00:40.000 being in San Francisco for the Lesbians Who Tech Summit 0:00:40.360 --> 0:00:45.440 that I have the opportunity to MC and co host, 0:00:45.680 --> 0:00:48.440 and I will tell you know, it's really hard when 0:00:48.479 --> 0:00:51.120 I'm on stage to be able to be in the news, 0:00:51.159 --> 0:00:54.560 and so when I have to dive back in, it's 0:00:54.600 --> 0:00:57.800 like I'm anticipating that things have changed, something has happened 0:00:57.800 --> 0:01:00.520 that is better than what it was prior, and that 0:01:00.680 --> 0:01:04.040 is certainly not the fucking case this week, coming back 0:01:04.080 --> 0:01:08.240 to realize that Jim Jordan was unable to clinch the 0:01:08.600 --> 0:01:13.160 speakership like Steve Scalise before him, that now there are 0:01:13.160 --> 0:01:15.560 a band of nine idiots that are running for this 0:01:15.680 --> 0:01:20.039 position that need that requires two hundred and seventeen votes, 0:01:20.319 --> 0:01:22.640 none of which these people have the ability to get. 0:01:23.480 --> 0:01:25.800 Don't think that you should know who these folks are, 0:01:25.880 --> 0:01:28.440 because no one knows who they are, including people inside 0:01:28.440 --> 0:01:31.399 of their own fucking party. You have a majority of them, 0:01:31.440 --> 0:01:33.920 if not all of them, voted to overturn the free 0:01:33.920 --> 0:01:36.840 and fair election in twenty twenty. So there's you know, 0:01:36.959 --> 0:01:41.360 hots off to those folks. And you know it is 0:01:42.760 --> 0:01:46.560 I can't express enough at a time when we are 0:01:46.640 --> 0:01:51.840 seeing such global unrest, we are wrestling with two fucking 0:01:51.920 --> 0:01:55.960 wars that are happening right now that America is essentially funding, 0:01:56.080 --> 0:01:59.000 because let us be real about that, that when you 0:01:59.080 --> 0:02:01.600 look at Ukraine and you look at what is happening 0:02:01.880 --> 0:02:06.160 to Gaza by Israel and in Israel, we're not in 0:02:06.200 --> 0:02:08.920 a great fucking place. And the fact is we have 0:02:09.160 --> 0:02:14.240 no House of Representatives that can approve the billions of 0:02:14.280 --> 0:02:19.000 dollars that are necessary to support allies, to get humanitarian aid, 0:02:19.320 --> 0:02:21.200 and to do whatever it is that we need to do. 0:02:21.320 --> 0:02:24.240 Oh and by the way, keep our own fucking government funded, 0:02:24.520 --> 0:02:28.799 which that shut down is coming November seventeenth. If in fact, 0:02:29.080 --> 0:02:34.079 we don't get twelve bills through the House of Representatives 0:02:34.120 --> 0:02:36.880 and the Senate that are able to fund government for 0:02:36.919 --> 0:02:40.160 an entire year, when I say that, we are in 0:02:40.280 --> 0:02:44.480 an absolute shit show, shit storm, shit Tornado. This is 0:02:44.480 --> 0:02:49.720 what I fucking mean, and coming into the presidential election 0:02:50.000 --> 0:02:52.320 where there are so many seats that are up. Not 0:02:52.400 --> 0:02:55.880 only are we talking about the presidential but we're talking 0:02:56.040 --> 0:02:58.680 about seats that are up in the Senate, seats that 0:02:58.720 --> 0:03:01.760 are up in the House. I just really don't know 0:03:02.080 --> 0:03:05.600 what Republicans are fucking running on. Right with their four 0:03:05.680 --> 0:03:08.240 seat majority in the House, what are they saying, vote 0:03:08.240 --> 0:03:10.280 for us, give us more seats so that we can 0:03:10.320 --> 0:03:14.919 show you just how fucking dysfunctional we are. It would 0:03:14.919 --> 0:03:18.840 be so comical if the times weren't so goddamn stark 0:03:18.880 --> 0:03:24.160 and serious, but they are right. And so I'm looking 0:03:24.240 --> 0:03:28.320 around after having taken a few days, and I'm just like, wow, 0:03:28.720 --> 0:03:32.000 so things have gotten even worse Because when you were 0:03:32.040 --> 0:03:35.400 starting out with a oh, Eescalise and a Jordan is 0:03:35.440 --> 0:03:38.920 who we're offering up, I'm like, no, there has got 0:03:38.960 --> 0:03:41.840 to be better people than that, And Republicans have shown 0:03:41.880 --> 0:03:44.440 me no, there are no better people. We just have 0:03:44.680 --> 0:03:51.880 nine worse people who you don't know, Yeah, wild, wild folks, 0:03:52.040 --> 0:03:56.400 And you know I know that right now there are 0:03:56.600 --> 0:03:59.680 people who are quitting jobs, getting fired from jobs, getting 0:03:59.720 --> 0:04:04.400 signed blind over their stances around what is happening in 0:04:04.640 --> 0:04:09.160 Israel and Palestine, that there are people in these United States, 0:04:09.200 --> 0:04:12.560 from a six year old Palestinian boy to now a 0:04:12.640 --> 0:04:18.240 forty year old rabbi in Detroit. The hate is overspilling. 0:04:18.720 --> 0:04:23.480 There is no way for us to watch the murders 0:04:23.520 --> 0:04:28.520 of close to now five thousand civilians in Gaza and 0:04:28.600 --> 0:04:32.440 think to ourselves, this is going well. These are people, 0:04:32.720 --> 0:04:37.880 these are largely children, right, that are being taken out 0:04:38.000 --> 0:04:41.880 as Israel goes to war with quote unquote Hamas, which 0:04:41.920 --> 0:04:45.960 by the way, they have been at war with for decades. 0:04:46.320 --> 0:04:49.839 So what makes this time any different other than the 0:04:49.920 --> 0:04:55.320 fact that fourteen hundred right Israeli's war murdered in the 0:04:55.400 --> 0:04:58.440 span of a week. So folks like I keep saying 0:04:58.480 --> 0:05:02.640 this that hate just begets eight, violence begets violence, and 0:05:02.760 --> 0:05:05.920 America coming out and saying that we're gonna continue funding 0:05:05.960 --> 0:05:11.000 this without understanding the repercussions of what that is and 0:05:11.120 --> 0:05:14.240 Joe Biden trying to align what is happening in the 0:05:14.240 --> 0:05:17.120 Middle East with what is happening in Ukraine and Russia, 0:05:17.400 --> 0:05:20.640 to me is a major fucking misstep. And I say 0:05:20.680 --> 0:05:24.200 it as somebody who is not a foreign leader, who 0:05:24.279 --> 0:05:29.560 is not a foreign relations expert, but is a person 0:05:29.600 --> 0:05:33.479 that believes in our collective humanity. These two things are 0:05:33.520 --> 0:05:36.320 not the fucking same, and trying to paint with a 0:05:36.320 --> 0:05:41.520 broad stroke is going to leave us. Leave this administration, 0:05:41.760 --> 0:05:46.119 I believe in a really bad place heading into twenty 0:05:46.200 --> 0:05:51.000 twenty four. Not to mention changing gears real quick, that 0:05:51.200 --> 0:05:55.520 Donald Trump still remains in a giant fucking pickle, as 0:05:55.839 --> 0:06:00.880 you have Sidney Powell and Chesburro who have leaded guilty, 0:06:01.560 --> 0:06:04.800 who are going to testify against Donald Trump, and the 0:06:04.880 --> 0:06:10.080 other folks like, oh my god. You know, I think 0:06:10.120 --> 0:06:12.360 that if I were to go away and come back 0:06:12.400 --> 0:06:16.200 a year later, sadly, I don't think much will have changed. 0:06:16.279 --> 0:06:20.000 So how we get through this with our sanity intact? 0:06:20.120 --> 0:06:23.920 Dear friends, that is going to be the where the 0:06:23.960 --> 0:06:30.040 real work is coming up next. I'm really looking forward 0:06:30.160 --> 0:06:34.360 to you all getting to hear this conversation with award 0:06:34.400 --> 0:06:39.880 winning journalist Vincent Bevins, whose new book is out now, 0:06:40.080 --> 0:06:44.320 If We Burn the Mass Protest Decade and the Missing Revolution. 0:06:44.880 --> 0:06:47.880 Vincent and I get into a conversation about his book 0:06:48.160 --> 0:06:52.320 about the decade of protests, and you know, essentially where 0:06:52.360 --> 0:06:55.000 we go from here. What we've learned over the last 0:06:55.040 --> 0:06:58.880 ten years, and what the future of protesting looks like 0:06:59.480 --> 0:07:03.200 given this state of our world, given the state of 0:07:03.279 --> 0:07:07.119 technology and social media, and how and where people gather 0:07:07.680 --> 0:07:15.040 that conversation Coming up next, folks, I am very happy 0:07:15.080 --> 0:07:18.640 to welcome to OKF Daily for the very first time 0:07:18.720 --> 0:07:24.360 award winning journalist Vincent Bevins, whose new book If We Burn, 0:07:24.680 --> 0:07:28.280 The Mass Protest Decade and the Missing Revolution is on 0:07:28.520 --> 0:07:33.040 stands now, which examine how the so called mass Protest 0:07:33.160 --> 0:07:37.760 decade failed to achieve meaningful change and what's next for 0:07:37.960 --> 0:07:42.880 activists who sacrificed so much. Vincent, Welcome to the show. 0:07:43.440 --> 0:07:44.280 Yeah, thank you so much. 0:07:45.400 --> 0:07:50.240 So let's dive in and talk about what you are seeing, 0:07:50.520 --> 0:07:55.040 what you saw as the mass protest decade, what led 0:07:55.160 --> 0:08:00.960 you to writing this book, and talk to us about 0:08:01.360 --> 0:08:06.040 bring us back to the last decade of upheaval right 0:08:06.160 --> 0:08:11.120 of activism that kind of woke many people up, not 0:08:11.200 --> 0:08:14.040 only in this country but around the globe. Yeah. 0:08:14.040 --> 0:08:17.240 Absolutely. I mean, I think there's two answers to the 0:08:17.320 --> 0:08:19.680 question of how I came to this project, why I 0:08:19.720 --> 0:08:22.600 decided to write a book like this. First of all, 0:08:22.640 --> 0:08:25.400 as far as we know, more people took part in 0:08:25.440 --> 0:08:27.920 mass protests around the world from twenty ten to twenty 0:08:27.960 --> 0:08:31.320 twenty than at any other point in human history. The 0:08:31.440 --> 0:08:34.400 wave of mass protests that really started in North Africa, Teunisia, 0:08:34.440 --> 0:08:37.520 and Egypt in twenty ten and then went basically global 0:08:37.559 --> 0:08:41.360 over the next ten years exceeded even the very contentious 0:08:41.760 --> 0:08:45.480 nineteen sixties. But in many cases, did we not only 0:08:45.559 --> 0:08:50.160 see things go nowhere, did we not only see protests 0:08:50.160 --> 0:08:53.200 simply not work because that would be less surprising. I mean, 0:08:53.240 --> 0:08:54.880 that was basically what happened back in two thousand and 0:08:54.920 --> 0:08:57.800 three with the protests against the Iraq War. What was 0:08:57.920 --> 0:09:01.880 very strange is the a parent phenomenon that many mass 0:09:01.880 --> 0:09:06.160 protests that seemed to be successful at first actually ended 0:09:06.240 --> 0:09:08.040 up leading to the opposite of what they asked for 0:09:08.080 --> 0:09:10.920 if you took a long enough timeline and examined what 0:09:10.960 --> 0:09:14.440 really happened in the years afterwards. So that's this big, big, 0:09:14.480 --> 0:09:18.280 sort of global question that seemed to present itself to 0:09:18.320 --> 0:09:20.080 me into a lot of people that I think do 0:09:20.160 --> 0:09:22.400 want to change the world. And then my own particular 0:09:22.440 --> 0:09:24.720 relation to this is that I was in Brazil in 0:09:24.760 --> 0:09:27.360 twenty thirteen when a mass protest organized by leftists and 0:09:27.360 --> 0:09:31.760 anarchists ultimately created the conditions, not on purpose, not right away, 0:09:31.960 --> 0:09:34.520 for the far right to take more power in that country. 0:09:34.520 --> 0:09:36.040 So it's kind of a personal story, but I think 0:09:36.080 --> 0:09:39.640 it is one that is quite relevant all around the planet. 0:09:40.400 --> 0:09:43.559 Well, let's talk about those places in which the opposite 0:09:43.600 --> 0:09:47.520 occurred from the mass protest that did take place, because 0:09:47.559 --> 0:09:51.080 I think that that is important. I think that you know, oftentimes, 0:09:51.160 --> 0:09:54.599 as someone you know myself who has participated in countless, 0:09:54.640 --> 0:09:59.559 countless marches, countless protests over the course of my political career, 0:10:00.240 --> 0:10:03.360 it has always been the fall safe right, if you 0:10:03.480 --> 0:10:06.560 don't like something, if you want something to change, get 0:10:06.720 --> 0:10:10.160 hundreds thousands or hundreds of thousands of people into the street, 0:10:10.640 --> 0:10:13.480 and then the change you want will happen. I'm making 0:10:13.520 --> 0:10:17.400 it obviously seem a little easier than we know that 0:10:17.480 --> 0:10:22.400 it is, but that's essentially the goal. When the opposite occurs, though, 0:10:23.440 --> 0:10:25.800 I think that it's not only shocking to those that 0:10:25.960 --> 0:10:28.720 did take to the streets, but those that are watching. 0:10:28.840 --> 0:10:32.040 And I'm wanting to get a sense of in your 0:10:32.120 --> 0:10:37.520 personal experience in Brazil, why do you think that that happened? Right? 0:10:37.679 --> 0:10:39.679 No, I think, and I think that quick summary of 0:10:40.320 --> 0:10:42.439 the way that we view these things is quite right. 0:10:42.480 --> 0:10:44.199 I think that deep down that's kind of an assumption 0:10:44.280 --> 0:10:46.800 that quite a lot of people had, definitely in Brazil, 0:10:47.000 --> 0:10:49.600 certainly in countries like Egypt, certainly in many other countries 0:10:49.640 --> 0:10:53.839 around the world, this idea that when there is injustice, 0:10:54.200 --> 0:11:00.440 when elites commit abuses against citizens, the natural, if not 0:11:00.480 --> 0:11:03.520 the only, if not the best, even the natural way 0:11:03.559 --> 0:11:05.760 to respond to that is a mass protest. And I 0:11:05.760 --> 0:11:08.520 try in this book to establish how that came together. Historically, 0:11:08.520 --> 0:11:11.079 this wasn't always the case. Even as recently in the 0:11:11.080 --> 0:11:13.400 fifties and early sixties, people would not have thought that 0:11:13.400 --> 0:11:16.760 that was the natural way to respond to injustice. But 0:11:16.800 --> 0:11:19.000 in our certainly by the twenty tens, I think that 0:11:19.080 --> 0:11:21.240 assumption was widely held, and it was held I think 0:11:21.240 --> 0:11:23.000 by me in a deep, deep part of my soul. 0:11:23.559 --> 0:11:26.840 And as you said, the idea was that if you 0:11:26.920 --> 0:11:31.000 got enough people, if everybody sort of came out, that 0:11:31.040 --> 0:11:34.320 would deliver the results. But what often happened, and I'll 0:11:34.400 --> 0:11:36.160 use Brazil as an example, I think Egypt is another 0:11:36.160 --> 0:11:39.240 a good one, is that the huge amounts of people 0:11:39.240 --> 0:11:42.240 that do come out to the streets Number one may 0:11:42.240 --> 0:11:44.160 not be the exact same people that you expected to 0:11:44.160 --> 0:11:45.880 come out. So in the case of Brazil, you really 0:11:45.920 --> 0:11:49.439 got a strange situation in which the new arrivals onto 0:11:49.480 --> 0:11:51.599 the streets had different ideas of what the protest was 0:11:51.640 --> 0:11:56.840 about than the original arrivals. Or number two. So many 0:11:56.880 --> 0:12:00.719 people can come to the streets. This schematic that you 0:12:00.840 --> 0:12:04.960 just outlined can be so can be so successful that 0:12:05.040 --> 0:12:09.480 actually a government is dislodged from power, or a government 0:12:09.559 --> 0:12:11.400 is in a position where they are so afraid of 0:12:11.440 --> 0:12:13.400 losing power that they would be willing to give something 0:12:13.480 --> 0:12:15.760 up to the streets in order to hold onto power. 0:12:16.280 --> 0:12:18.880 But in that case of this unexpected power vacuum, and 0:12:19.120 --> 0:12:23.760 in that case of an unexpected moment when results can 0:12:23.800 --> 0:12:26.960 be seized or power can be seized, the kind of 0:12:27.080 --> 0:12:30.199 protest that became dominant in the twenty tens, I think 0:12:30.200 --> 0:12:32.800 a protest in general, but specifically the kind of protest 0:12:32.840 --> 0:12:35.040 that became dominant in the twenty tens has a very 0:12:35.040 --> 0:12:37.800 hard time taking advantage of that power vacuum. So often 0:12:37.840 --> 0:12:40.600 what we saw, to the great horror of the original activists, 0:12:40.600 --> 0:12:44.000 say in Egypt or in Brazil, is other actors, whether elites, 0:12:44.440 --> 0:12:48.520 foreign governments, which intervene. But whoever's around and savvy enough 0:12:48.640 --> 0:12:52.959 and wants to sees that power vacuum, sees step into 0:12:53.000 --> 0:12:56.520 the power vacuum and sees sees the day for their 0:12:56.559 --> 0:12:59.199 own purposes. And they often have very very different ideas 0:12:59.720 --> 0:13:01.920 about how to change society and the people who organized 0:13:01.920 --> 0:13:05.560 their protests and they may indeed have the exact opposite ideas, 0:13:05.600 --> 0:13:07.959 but they're ready, they're organized, and they step into the 0:13:08.040 --> 0:13:10.839 vacuum that was accidentally, unexpectedly created by huge amounts of 0:13:10.840 --> 0:13:13.400 people in the streets and take things forward in their 0:13:13.400 --> 0:13:13.920 own direction. 0:13:15.440 --> 0:13:19.720 I mean, it's pretty you know, it's an extraordinary feat, 0:13:20.040 --> 0:13:25.080 right to get people organized in such a way where 0:13:25.120 --> 0:13:27.840 they go out into the streets, right, Like I think 0:13:27.920 --> 0:13:31.840 about twenty twenty, I think about the most recent mass 0:13:31.920 --> 0:13:35.080 protests that we had seen in this country that did 0:13:35.160 --> 0:13:38.520 spark global outrage, and that was on the murder of 0:13:38.760 --> 0:13:42.120 George Floyd, where we saw, in the midst of a 0:13:42.160 --> 0:13:47.319 global health pandemic, pre having vaccines and really understanding how 0:13:47.360 --> 0:13:51.920 this pandemic was spreading, people take to the streets in 0:13:52.040 --> 0:13:56.560 their outrage and collective grief right that they experienced at 0:13:56.559 --> 0:14:00.400 the hands of watching a murder take place on video, 0:14:01.320 --> 0:14:04.840 and so I kind of want to get your thoughts 0:14:05.000 --> 0:14:10.240 there on how you saw the difference in twenty twenty 0:14:10.320 --> 0:14:13.560 versus let's say twenty ten, right at the beginning of 0:14:13.600 --> 0:14:18.000 the decade that you're viewing, what changed during this time, Vincent, 0:14:18.120 --> 0:14:22.320 and like, why was it so palpable in twenty twenty. 0:14:23.080 --> 0:14:25.040 Yeah, And I think I think that's a really good question. 0:14:25.080 --> 0:14:26.800 I think there's maybe three ways I can answer it 0:14:26.840 --> 0:14:29.760 if I can go sort of later. I think that 0:14:31.040 --> 0:14:33.840 first of all, across what I call the mass protest decade, 0:14:34.480 --> 0:14:37.560 often the spark, often the thing that does get people 0:14:37.600 --> 0:14:42.160 onto the streets is a shocking case of police brutality. 0:14:42.240 --> 0:14:44.360 So this is what we forget. This, this is what started. 0:14:45.480 --> 0:14:47.520 This is what started the so called Arab spring. This 0:14:47.600 --> 0:14:51.600 in Tunisia, it was originally a fruit vendor that was harassing, 0:14:52.440 --> 0:14:55.480 that was protesting harassment from a local official. In Egypt, 0:14:55.480 --> 0:14:58.840 it was a protest against police brutality. In Brazil, it 0:14:59.000 --> 0:15:02.960 was viral images of a crackdown on ultimately journalists that 0:15:03.080 --> 0:15:05.680 set off set the country on fire. So this kind 0:15:05.680 --> 0:15:09.960 of thing is I think extremely powerful. I think that 0:15:10.000 --> 0:15:17.040 across many many national and economic conditions, across countries. Basically 0:15:17.640 --> 0:15:21.280 you have an awareness that police brutality is real. It 0:15:21.360 --> 0:15:24.080 is the way that the existing power structure reproduces itself, 0:15:24.080 --> 0:15:26.800 that it stays in power, and it is quite shocking 0:15:26.840 --> 0:15:29.760 when regular people see it. But the second thing I 0:15:29.800 --> 0:15:31.280 will say is that you said it's quite hard to 0:15:31.280 --> 0:15:34.640 get people organized to come out like this. I think 0:15:34.680 --> 0:15:42.600 that actually what is so powerful, or indeed, initially it 0:15:42.680 --> 0:15:45.280 seems to be powerful about this particular type of protest. 0:15:45.360 --> 0:15:49.160 And I lay out all of these various ingredients in 0:15:49.200 --> 0:15:51.040 the book, and I expend with where they come from, 0:15:51.080 --> 0:15:53.720 but just to summarize what it is, I say that 0:15:53.760 --> 0:16:00.320 these are apparently spontaneous, leaderless, digitally coordinated, horizontal to the 0:16:00.440 --> 0:16:04.080 organized mass protests. And I think the thing that makes 0:16:04.080 --> 0:16:07.120 them so successful and far far more successful than a 0:16:07.120 --> 0:16:09.520 lot of the people that put together this specific recipe 0:16:09.800 --> 0:16:13.160 had ever expected, is that you don't require much organization. 0:16:13.440 --> 0:16:16.800 Like everybody can see a viral video at two pm 0:16:16.880 --> 0:16:19.760 and be on the streets at five pm and or 0:16:20.520 --> 0:16:24.120 at two ten pm and not necessarily know each other, 0:16:24.200 --> 0:16:26.840 not necessarily have the same ideas as to what would 0:16:26.880 --> 0:16:30.000 you what you would do if you know you were 0:16:30.040 --> 0:16:31.920 to be successful, if you were to, you know, I 0:16:31.960 --> 0:16:34.000 don't think in twenty twenty the goal would have been 0:16:34.080 --> 0:16:38.560 or you would have necessarily wanted to, like overthrow the 0:16:38.600 --> 0:16:40.680 government of the United States. Maybe some people did, but 0:16:40.920 --> 0:16:43.000 certainly if that were the ultimate goal, I think people 0:16:43.000 --> 0:16:44.840 would have different ideas about how what was supposed to 0:16:44.880 --> 0:16:49.360 happen afterwards. And so the question of this type of 0:16:49.480 --> 0:16:54.160 organization of people, people coming together around a response to 0:16:54.200 --> 0:17:03.000 a particular active injustice is really really good at mobilizing people, 0:17:03.000 --> 0:17:05.840 but it doesn't require pre existing organization. So in the 0:17:05.880 --> 0:17:08.679 case of many other countries in what I call the 0:17:08.680 --> 0:17:12.840 mass protest decade, they got onto the streets with very 0:17:12.960 --> 0:17:14.639 very different ideas of what they were supposed to be 0:17:14.680 --> 0:17:17.440 there for, and then they ended up there fighting, expelling 0:17:17.480 --> 0:17:19.879 each other from the streets, having real battles over the 0:17:19.880 --> 0:17:23.160 future of the movement. And if there had been sort 0:17:23.160 --> 0:17:24.760 of and again this is a very very difficult thing 0:17:24.800 --> 0:17:27.280 to do. If you had the kind of organizations which 0:17:27.280 --> 0:17:29.960 would have been more common in the fifties and sixties, 0:17:30.359 --> 0:17:33.800 you probably would have had some pre existing understanding of 0:17:33.920 --> 0:17:36.080 how to work together in the streets. But again that 0:17:36.240 --> 0:17:39.720 was very very difficult to put together. The Internet in general, 0:17:39.720 --> 0:17:42.880 but specific types of social media firms that we saw 0:17:42.960 --> 0:17:45.280 become dominant twenty tens made it very very easy to 0:17:45.320 --> 0:17:48.600 get people together, at least on the streets. So the 0:17:48.720 --> 0:17:53.240 question in my book specifically, I focus on January first, 0:17:53.760 --> 0:17:58.000 twenty ten to January first, twenty twenty. But I've been 0:17:58.119 --> 0:18:00.440 very gratified to hear that a lot of people that 0:18:00.480 --> 0:18:05.119 were intimately involved in organizing around racial justice and police 0:18:05.119 --> 0:18:08.240 brutality in the United States over those years found they 0:18:08.280 --> 0:18:11.200 told me that certain other things in other countries resonated 0:18:11.200 --> 0:18:13.359 with things that they had been through. I was really, 0:18:13.440 --> 0:18:15.920 you know, grateful to hear that. But I don't specifically 0:18:15.920 --> 0:18:19.480 go into exactly twenty twenty. But to answer your final 0:18:19.560 --> 0:18:22.200 question in my three part answer to your to your 0:18:22.280 --> 0:18:24.320 very your good question, because it because it had so 0:18:24.440 --> 0:18:27.399 much in it, I think not that much changed. Really. 0:18:27.480 --> 0:18:30.720 I think, really kind of by twenty twenty, you had 0:18:30.760 --> 0:18:34.400 the reproduction of the model that was in I don't 0:18:34.440 --> 0:18:36.160 want to say in style because that makes it sound 0:18:36.160 --> 0:18:39.160 a little bit too weak, but that had been seen 0:18:39.200 --> 0:18:42.639 as natural and effective and the obvious way to respond 0:18:42.640 --> 0:18:47.479 to injustice, back to basically Takoir Square in Egypt, in 0:18:47.520 --> 0:18:49.679 twenty eleven, and I think the strange thing about this 0:18:49.720 --> 0:18:51.960 decade is that a lot of a lot of the 0:18:52.000 --> 0:18:56.440 most powerful or seemingly powerful methods get reproduced even after, 0:18:56.680 --> 0:18:59.199 you know, not only in very very different national situations, 0:18:59.200 --> 0:19:01.800 but after it's becomes clear that they didn't work out 0:19:01.800 --> 0:19:04.680 in the original case. So Egypt, for example, by twenty thirteen, 0:19:04.880 --> 0:19:07.200 just to list one of the quick examples of how 0:19:07.200 --> 0:19:09.359 things got worse. By twenty thirteen, there was a coup 0:19:09.760 --> 0:19:13.399 which derailed the incipient democratic revolution in Egypt and installed 0:19:13.440 --> 0:19:16.760 the dictator that was even worse. So I think the 0:19:17.480 --> 0:19:20.200 ease with which this kind of thing can come together 0:19:20.440 --> 0:19:23.159 in the era of digital connectivity, which is often I 0:19:23.200 --> 0:19:27.920 think a false connected, like we feel like we're connected, 0:19:27.920 --> 0:19:30.960 but really we're sitting at home alone looking at our computers, 0:19:31.400 --> 0:19:34.440 the ease with which this kind of connectivity allows for 0:19:34.520 --> 0:19:37.280 a certain type of protest to come together didn't really change, 0:19:37.280 --> 0:19:38.919 I think from twenty ten to twenty twenty. I think 0:19:38.960 --> 0:19:41.439 it is kind of the same approach that we saw 0:19:42.000 --> 0:19:42.640 at the beginning. 0:19:45.760 --> 0:19:50.920 How do you think that the advent of misinformation and 0:19:51.280 --> 0:19:55.639 just you know, lies, alternative facts, these kinds of troll 0:19:55.720 --> 0:20:00.960 farms play into the willingness and the ability for people 0:20:01.000 --> 0:20:05.000 to glean information quickly download it, and then get into 0:20:05.080 --> 0:20:05.840 the streets. 0:20:06.040 --> 0:20:08.800 Yeah, I think this is a big thing that changed. 0:20:08.920 --> 0:20:11.480 This is one thing that does absolutely change from twenty 0:20:11.520 --> 0:20:16.080 ten to twenty twenty. I'm not that old, but I'm 0:20:16.080 --> 0:20:18.320 old enough to remember something that is often shocking to 0:20:18.440 --> 0:20:22.520 like properly young people that I speak to that two 0:20:22.520 --> 0:20:25.520 thousand and eight, two thousand nine, ten, twenty eleven. The 0:20:25.560 --> 0:20:29.919 dominant idea, the dominant approach to the Internet was to 0:20:30.000 --> 0:20:33.520 believe that anything that happened because of the Internet, anything 0:20:33.520 --> 0:20:37.679 that happened because of social media, was inherently progressive, Like 0:20:37.960 --> 0:20:41.640 the Internet would just make the world more transparent, more democratic, 0:20:41.760 --> 0:20:43.720 people would have more access to truth, more people would 0:20:43.720 --> 0:20:46.720 be able to raise their voices. Whatever you thought should 0:20:46.760 --> 0:20:49.439 happen to the global system. You thought that the Internet 0:20:49.480 --> 0:20:53.360 was going to push us there. Now, slowly across the decade, 0:20:53.880 --> 0:20:56.800 specifically in the US, by like twenty fifteen twenty sixteen, 0:20:57.359 --> 0:21:00.400 we started to realize a couple things. One we didn't 0:21:00.440 --> 0:21:03.960 get like the internet full stop. We didn't get the 0:21:04.040 --> 0:21:06.720 Internet in the abstract. We got a specific set of 0:21:06.800 --> 0:21:10.720 online experiences that were shaped by for profit firms which 0:21:11.000 --> 0:21:13.480 manipulate what we see in order to some more advertising 0:21:14.640 --> 0:21:17.159 that that moves certain things to the top of your 0:21:17.160 --> 0:21:18.720 feed based on what they think will keep you glued 0:21:18.760 --> 0:21:21.520 to your phones. We didn't just get like the Internet 0:21:21.560 --> 0:21:24.600 in its full in its full power, right, we got 0:21:24.640 --> 0:21:27.439 a specific type of Internet, and by twenty sixteen, I 0:21:27.480 --> 0:21:29.959 think people started to realize, like, oh, anybody, you can 0:21:30.040 --> 0:21:36.480 use the Internet to say whatever, right, powerful, powerful individuals, governments, 0:21:36.640 --> 0:21:40.800 corporations figured out how to do viral posts. They figured 0:21:40.800 --> 0:21:43.640 out how to spread the message that they wanted to spread. 0:21:43.720 --> 0:21:46.640 And I think by twenty twenty, twenty one, twenty twenty three, 0:21:47.440 --> 0:21:49.720 if you think about sort of the way that liberal 0:21:49.720 --> 0:21:53.520 media in the United States would cover a apparently spontaneous 0:21:53.600 --> 0:21:56.160 mass of people marching on a capitol because of something 0:21:56.240 --> 0:21:58.920 they saw online back in twenty ten, that would have 0:21:58.960 --> 0:22:02.120 been read as necessarily good. In twenty twenty three, people 0:22:02.160 --> 0:22:04.240 might think, Okay, but who are these guys, Like, what 0:22:04.760 --> 0:22:06.920 are they doing? What did they see online? What part 0:22:06.920 --> 0:22:09.119 of the Internet have they have they been hanging out in? 0:22:09.400 --> 0:22:11.720 And I think this is something that is a reversal 0:22:11.800 --> 0:22:14.199 that is really unfortunate, because I don't think that the 0:22:14.200 --> 0:22:16.600 Internet had to be that way. But the Internet that 0:22:16.600 --> 0:22:18.440 we now live on is that way, and that really 0:22:18.480 --> 0:22:21.840 affects the ways that what seemed to be so libratory 0:22:21.880 --> 0:22:26.120 about movements brought together partially by social media because many 0:22:26.119 --> 0:22:28.240 many other factors bring them together. There's all the material 0:22:28.600 --> 0:22:33.240 and real societal factors that bring people together. But the 0:22:34.000 --> 0:22:37.439 movements that are brought together by partially social media end 0:22:37.560 --> 0:22:39.480 up having more problems than they should. 0:22:39.160 --> 0:22:40.600 If we had the Internet that I think that we 0:22:40.600 --> 0:22:44.480 could do you think, then, Vincent, to be honest, it's 0:22:44.480 --> 0:22:46.600 not as if the genie is going to go back 0:22:46.600 --> 0:22:48.959 in the bottle, right in terms of the Internet and 0:22:49.000 --> 0:22:52.520 how we see it and what we had dreamt about 0:22:52.600 --> 0:22:56.800 the democratization of information, right like that was the thing 0:22:57.000 --> 0:22:59.360 was that there were all these gatekeepers, whether you were 0:22:59.359 --> 0:23:03.160 looking at you know, networks or you're looking at studios, 0:23:03.280 --> 0:23:06.560 and that the Internet was going to be this gatekeeper 0:23:06.680 --> 0:23:10.120 lists place right where everyone had a voice and could 0:23:10.119 --> 0:23:12.639 be an eyewitness reporter and so on and so forth. 0:23:13.560 --> 0:23:15.640 The genie is not going to go back in the bottle. 0:23:15.720 --> 0:23:19.400 But do you think that because of how we now 0:23:19.600 --> 0:23:24.960 understand the Internet to be this force of capitalism right, 0:23:26.040 --> 0:23:32.440 end of misinformation, that we then at some point kind 0:23:32.480 --> 0:23:39.040 of revert back to the original contours of what organizing 0:23:39.240 --> 0:23:40.600 and protesting was. 0:23:41.119 --> 0:23:44.320 Yeah, I think absolutely. I think your last point, I 0:23:44.320 --> 0:23:49.240 mean to do this book to reconstruct this work of history, 0:23:49.280 --> 0:23:52.360